Love and the Loveless

by Henry Williamson

  “What did you say your name was?”

  “Maddison, sir.”

  “H’m. I remember you now. Where did you just come from, the stage door?”

  “No, sir, from the bar. I felt a bit faint, sir.”

  “Well, don’t forget your cap next time.”

  “No, sir.”

  Phillip went back to the bar, conscious that Brendon was following him upstairs.

  “Cavé, chaps! A.P.M. coming up!”

  Major Brendon entered a sedate atmosphere. He prowled around, short leather-covered cane under one arm, hands behind back. He did not speak. Nobody appeared to notice him, except Phillip, who saw him looking at the two wound stripes on his sleeve. The A.P.M. said, “I will see you outside.” Phillip put on his cap, and followed him out.

  “You know of course that it is an offence to put up wound stripes to which you are not entitled?”

  Now that he was on safe ground, Phillip pretended innocence. “It never really occurred to me, sir.”

  “You know that ignorance is no excuse?”

  “You mean generally, sir?”

  “I mean particularly. Now answer my questions! I want a limited answer to a limited question! Very well. Why are you wearing two wound stripes?”

  “I was twice wounded, sir.”

  “Where were you hit?”

  “In front of Ovillers, sir.”

  “I did not ask what locality, but where you were hit.”

  “In the leg, sir.”

  “Which leg?”

  “My left leg, sir.”

  “What hit you?”

  “Two machine-gun bullets, and shrapnel, sir.”

  “All at the same time?”

  “No, sir, but the same morning.”

  “How do I know that you are not lying?”

  “I cannot answer that question, sir.”

  “Why can’t you?”

  “Because I do not know your mental processes, sir.”

  “Are you trying to be impertinent?”

  “No, sir. I was trying to give a limited answer to a limited question.”

  “What question?”

  He wondered if his breath smelled like Major Brendon’s, when he had had a drink. “You said, sir, ‘How do I know that you are not lying?’”

  “Well?”

  “Well, sir, I cannot say.”

  “Splitting hairs, eh? Well, watch your step! I know all about you, and if I find you misbehaving, as you did at Heathmarket, I’ll run you before the General! Understand?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  The A.P.M. turned away. Phillip watched him down the stairs, then went back to the bar.

  “What did the old bastard want you for?”

  “Oh, I used to know him, he’s an old C.I.V. Boer War wallah who never heard so much as a bullet whistle, so now he’s the heavy martinet.”

  “Looked a proper twott to me,” said Pinnegar. “Chin chin, old man! I say, Phil, let’s try and get in the same company, shall we?” He beamed at Phillip, who said, with sudden release of warmth, “Rather, Teddy!”

  *

  On Monday, when he asked to be allowed to join the Transport Course, Phillip was directed to a hut wherein sat an officer with red tabs and Lancer buttons, who said, “Didn’t I hear you talking about Julian Grenfell in the Angel on Saturday afternoon? I’ll give you a chit. Take this to ‘H’ lines, Belton, and report to the Orderly Room there.”

  Chapter 2

  RIDING SCHOOL

  Belton looked shabbier than when he had seen it in the spring. Much of the park and the surrounding grassland was now the colour of the soldiers’ uniforms. Tens of thousands of feet and hooves and wheels had torn and discoloured the sward. Horses, riders, waggons, limbers, drivers, mules were daily in movement upon the landscape.

  Having reported to ‘H’ lines, he was sent to a troop, under a Riding Master, which was being formed that morning. With about a dozen other subalterns he was put in a section under a sergeant, who led the way to a hut, where, to Phillip’s disappointment, they were told to seat themselves on forms for a lecture upon The Saddle.

  He found no interest in this, so retired into the world of memory, hearing odd sentences across his mind-pictures.

  “There are seven parts of the Saddle. They are, facing the horse’s head, the Pommel, the Seat, the Cantle, the Flaps, Sweat Flaps, V-shape attachment, and Girth Tabs. The saddle should be placed in the centre of the horse’s back, the front being one hand’s-breadth from the play of the shoulder. Have you all got that down, gentlemen?”

  No need to write it down, it’s in the 2/- book I bought in Grantham, Training for Transport Officers and Horsemanship. If Desmond would only understand two things: that Lily had never really been his girl, because she did not love him; that he had never tried to get Lily for himself. Will it be any good if I write to Eugene, who was Desmond’s friend first, and ask him to explain?

  “The girth should lie flat and smooth around the horse’s belly. It should admit one finger between it and the belly, the finger being placed in from the rear to the front, so that the hair is left lying in the right direction.”

  Pencils moved over note-books. Phillip sat withdrawn, mourning alone.

  “If the hair is left ruffled under the girth, a girth-gall will be caused. The girth having been tightened by the straps provided, the surcingle should be placed over the saddle and girth and be as tight but no tighter than the girth. If the surcingle be tighter than the girth, the surcingle will rub and pinch the horse’s skin, which would cause a most serious girth-gall.”

  He lived again the scene wherein Desmond had said that it would be best for everyone if he were killed. You are too complicated a person to live.

  “The buckle of the surcingle should always be under the belly and in a direct line with the forelegs so as to escape rubbing the points of the elbows.”

  It would be no good writing to Eugene.

  At the end of the hour a copy of The Horse’s Prayer was given to each officer, a free issue from Our Dumb Friends League. Phillip glanced through it, and began to scoff inwardly, as he thought of the Riding School nags.

  To Thee, my Master, I offer my prayer: Feed me, water and care for me, and, when the day’s work is done, provide me with shelter, a dry clean bed and a stall enough for me to lie down in comfort.

  Always be kind to me. Talk to me. Your voice often means as much to me as the reins. Gentle me sometimes, that I may learn to love you. Do not jerk the reins, and do not whip me when going up hill. Never strike, beat, or kick me when I do not understand what you want … watch me, and if I fail to do your bidding, see if something is wrong with my harness, or my feet … never put a frosty bit in my mouth … I often fall on the hard pavements which I have often prayed might not be of wood but of such a nature as to give me a safe and sure footing.

  Remember that I must be ready at any moment to lose my life in your service.

  He thought of the horses and mules lying beside the Harrow Road leading up to Loos: and the Dumb Friends League did not seem so funny.

  And finally, O my Master, when my useful strength is gone, do not turn me out to starve or freeze, or sell me to some cruel owner, to be slowly starved and worked to death; but do Thou, my Master, take my life in the kindest way, and your God will reward you here and hereafter.

  You will not consider me irreverent if I ask this in the name of Him who was born in a stable. Amen.

  They left the hut and made their way to the picket lines, two long rows of horses tied to a rope and facing each other. Phillip had the same sergeant instructor as he had had during the spring: a sturdy, dark cavalryman, one of the original B.E.F. It seemed that the same old mounts were in use for the Riding School, too, a miscellaneous herd ranging between fifteen and seventeen hands high, hairies used to carrying awkward loads which usually began by patting their necks nervously, and continued the enforced relationship by speaking to them with two words only, Whoa Back, in tones of voice varying from
confidential whisper to guttural threat. Nearly all the hairies were hard-mouthed from continual tuggings at the bits across their tongues, the curbed ends of which were chained around their lower jaws. Some horses, he knew, avoided this discomfort by working their bits forward between the teeth, so that a succession of booted rein-tuggers, their spur-rowels filed down for safety, and accustomed to handlebar steering, usually failed to elicit even a protesting shake of head, but only a continued neck-rigid boring as they sat forked, without balance, alarmingly high above the ground.

  Before mounting, Phillip allowed the groom to show him what he knew already: the adjustment of stirrup leathers, by buckles under the saddle flaps, to the length of his arm from shoulder-pit to finger-tips. This equalled the length of leg, with heel well down, from boot to just above the knee.

  “Prepare to mount! Mount!”

  He was already familiar with the routine; and holding the reins in the approved manner through the fingers of his left hand, he pressed on the horse’s withers while putting his left foot into the burnished iron. Then hopping up, he threw his right leg over the saddle and thrust the boot into the iron with one kick, thus completing mounting in one motion.

  “I see you’ve ridden before, sir,” remarked the sergeant, whose horse was standing nearby.

  “You taught me, sergeant.”

  “I thought I recalled your face, sir.”

  Other pupils were still trying to mount. Phillip watched some arriving, with an appearance of being bent, upon the unfamiliar saddle level. Others clung to the near-side flanks of their horses, desperately clawing themselves up, or putting arms round horse-necks, descended to try again. One corpulent and elderly subaltern—he must have been quite thirty, Phillip thought—strove so desperately that he slid over his horse’s back and fell to the ground on the other side, an action that drew from the Riding Master, who had arrived silently at a walk and was sitting, apart and motionless, regarding the scene before him, a morose comment of, “Sit your mount, sir, sit your mount, you are not a member of a Circus, sir!”

  At last all in the troop were mounted. The sergeant quietly gave the order, “Section! In file, walk march!” and the cavalcade set out across the park. After watching them sombrely for a few more minutes the statuesque Riding Master—a first-class warrant officer whose face with its long rope-like moustaches was almost concealed by a flat-crowned cap held low by a strap under his chin—set off to regard another section, his long-legged chestnut mare silky in coat and action carrying him away, lightly and seemingly without effort, with a delicate action. Enviously Phillip watched what appeared to be the lightest wavy motion diminishing away behind the long tail of the chestnut. “We call that the South African triple canter,” said the sergeant at his side. “It’s one leg—three legs—one leg—three legs, if you watch.”

  “It’s a lovely motion, sergeant! How much is due to the mount, and how much to the rider?”

  “You’ll learn, sir. Section, trot!”

  It wasn’t so bad as he had dreaded. While most of the others were being bumped about in body and mind, at times uttering little prayers to their mounts, he found that he could keep himself fairly upright in the up-and-down rising motion. The knowledge that his leg seemed all right enlivened him, so that he wanted to shout aloud. Round and round in a ring the trotting went, while he felt more and more sure of himself.

  “Section, halt! Gentlemen, cross your irons over the pommels of your saddles! Section! Walk March! Section, trot!”

  This was something quite different. Jog jog jog jog jog, discomfort, discomfort, pain pain pain. Hold breath. Jog jog jog. Oh God, I have lost my sense of balance. The muscles of my left leg are no good. Hold breath against pain. Bump, bump, bump.

  “Sit down to it, sir, sit down to it! I could jump between you and the horse’s back, sir. Sit down to it! Why, what’s the matter with you? You want an armchair, not a horse! Grip your mount’s barrel with your calves, sir, keep those heels down, those toes up.” Thank God the sergeant was not talking to him, after all. And thank God when it was all over for the day.

  After tea he met Teddy Pinnegar in the bar of the Angel; life seemed good, with the marks of ‘leathers’ diagonal on his boots, and rubbing marks of saddle on buckskin strappings.

  The next day the lecture was on the Ailments of the Horse—Curb, Capped Hock, Thorough-pin, Thrush, Bog Spavin, Bone Spavin, Capped Elbow, Ring Bone, Sprained Tendon, Splints, Wind Gall. The Yorkshire Boot for the horse that brushed. How to kill a horse humanely. In the afternoon another schooling, this time trotting bare-back round and round the endless ring, nose of wooden hairy horse following docked tail of hairy dobbin, round and round in trodden circle, hot sack-like figures hoping desperately to grip and balance on hairy barrels either too wide or too agonisingly tall with razor backs more like crags of a coral reef than a razor. Variations of The Horse’s Prayer were groaned, sibilated, and pleaded. Go slower you brute, don’t shake about so, go steady you brute! O why in hell did I say I could ride? What must the T.T.O. think of me, now that he probably knows about me? Good horse, dear old Dobbin, or whatever your bloody name is, steady now, steady old ’oss. Jog jog jog, how long will it go on, I shall fall, on on on, round and round. Try to shove down heels with toes up. No good, it hurts like hell on the base of my spine, and I can’t grip at the same time with my calves, my left leg is numb, I’m a crock. I’ll fall off any moment now. Jag, jag, jag, the joint of my thigh is like broken glass, perhaps a fracture is only now showing itself. Stab stab, O for a rest, how much longer, try and grip with the calves, to stop being flung up like a broken bottle grating every time this hairy brute trots. O how much longer, stop stop stop, I can’t stand it any more. Jog, jog, jog, the landscape swaying at all angles. At last, at last.

  “Now when I give the command to halt, each officer will draw back the reins and apply an even pressure on the bit, raising the reins as he does so, to lift the ’oss’s ’ead, while the right hand is smartly raised to inform the rider be’ind of ’is intention to ’alt! Wait for it! Wait for it! Watch it now, and let me see no sloppiness this time! Kiss your ’oss’s necks afterwards, give them sugar if you like but don’t fall on the ’oss’s neck and embrace the ’oss between the ears, in public, it isn’t done, not while I’m watchin’ anyway. Now wait for it! Section! ’ALT!”

  Phillip’s mount was waiting for it. Schooled to the sergeant’s voice, it stopped so abruptly that its rider’s raised right hand went forward with his body, to clutch the mount’s mane for security.

  “All right, dismount, gentlemen,” said the instructor, quietly, all criticism forgotten. “Fall out for ten minutes.”

  Gaspers were soon being puffed by figures feeling themselves to be crook-backs, fossilised frogs, and sawn partly in half.

  *

  Phillip felt sure, as the days went on, that most of the horses of the riding school were duds. They had no spirit beyond that of slavery, their mouths were hardened by being pulled by the hands of Tom, Dick and Harry, their minds set in trying to avoid boring labour. Why was it that both the sergeant instructor and the Riding Master could fly the jumps, one after another, in a series of smooth wavy motions, their horses doing it with the slightest of directions? Because they had had the pick of the best horses! The sergeant rode a quiet, beautiful horse. Phillip asked about it.

  “Ah, now you’re talkin’, sir! Blood will tell, in man and beast! Arab blood, gentlemen, is revealed in the large brown intelligent eye, the broad for’ed, in the spirit that is both dashin’ and disciplined—taking the least of ’ints, controlled by intelligence holdin’ fire in check!”

  The feeling of Grenfell’s Into Battle. These old cavalrymen had the right understanding——

  The jumps were five in number. The first only could be approached at right angles, for the course was both short and circular.

  “Now, Mr. Maddison, sir, you have been on the course before, so show the other gentlemen how to take the jumps, will you please, sir.”
/>   Phillip had named his mount, to himself and the animal, The Cocoanut. Now, with a muttered prayer to the hacked-out spirit of The Cocoanut, he approached the first fence, thinking of Mr. Facey Romford in the Surtees novel which he had read as a boy, at a jog trot. Four lengths away from the fence he banged with his heels, to urge his mount into a canter; but the only effect of rib-tapping was to cause a momentary enlivened trot, which after progress of about one length of The Cocoanut became a riding-school jog once more.

  “Don’t forget to ’old your ’oss back, will you, sir, we don’t want to see it dashin’ its knees against the obstacle, do we, sir?”

  Desperately Phillip kicked again; the kicks seemed to bounce back as the animal stopped before the fence.

  “Hold your mount back, sir, my word, you’re on a bit of blood, sir! Never mind, try agen! This time, try not to think that you two are goin’ to a funeral!”

  Repeated kickings animated The Cocoanut into a walking pace past the side of the jump.

  “Never mind! Try agen, sir! Third time lucky!”

  Back, you brute, back, good old horse, dear old Cocoanut, be a sport. At the tone of voice, the sport turned round and began to trot amiably in the direction of the picket line. Phillip managed to pull its head round, while travelling in a wide circle.

  “What are you two practisin’? Pulling a grass-cutter around a hayfield, sir?”

  The instructor dismounted. He pulled a long whippy stick from the first fence. “Now put your mount to the jump, sir!”

  At the sight of the long stick The Cocoanut showed some obedience; for it broke into a canter from its former amble, after which it stopped suddenly at the jump. Back again; further goading; a skittish prancing forward, a make-belief of taking-off which became a barging through the horizontal poles laced with spruce branches. Back once more; head turned round; the sergeant running behind it, whippy stick swishing, swoosh! on its hind-quarters, whereupon The Cocoanut gave a leap like a buck-rabbit and lifted its front legs over the poles, before stopping so abruptly that it parted from its helpless rider, who went over the jump by himself, heels following head and arms.